How bad is the multiboxing?

[Vireys]

Thinking of getting back to EvE as subbed player (the free model is really bad), but last time i played there seemed to be exessive amount of players multiboxing to the extreme (playing several accounts at once) and thus making the uneven play field even more uneven.

What is your experience guys, do people still go grazy with multiboxing?

Lord knows its a expensive and time consuming process to IP one character, but to think i would have to sub and IP 2+ accounts just to be on par with everyone else is a bit too steep with my wallet with the risen monthly fee as an added negative.

Any thoughts?

Any other negative aspects i should take in to consideration before making my decision? IS there still good 1v1 fights to be had or is it just gang warfare with fleet bros and multiboxers?

[Heathy]

well a vast majority of the pve is done solo, because it simply doesn't really scale that well (so there are plenty of ppl out there killing npcs by themselves in a place where you can tackle them). you can get 1v1s especially in faction warfare. but it is beneficial to group up there is nothing that separates small groups and solos from huge blobs. the only thing you can do is join a wormhole corp and then the size of escalations is capped by mass limits. you can't really have massive blobs roaming through w-space because they'll roll themselves apart.

I personally don't like trying to play two characters on grid at the same time, tabbing between them and locking new targets and pressing f1, its clunky, using characters as scouts or warp-ins, market alts, hauling alts etc. this is the larger portion of multi boxing, doing things that doesn't require all of your attention. I can probably dual box a basilisk chain, just two logis but my reaction time on healing ppl with both characters is going to be severely hampered. its wayyy better that all ships on grid fighting, are being controlled by an actual player. needing to tab back and forth just becomes a clusterfk the more accounts you're doing that with. tabbing to lock new ppl, tabbing to see which of your characters is being primaried, tabbing to make sure each character is still anchored or aligned its just confusing. you get to the point where you can have a capital pilot on grid with a subcap pilot, some combos might work but some are just too moment to moment intensive and you'll be splitting your reaction time across two clients. I don't think dual boxing logi is going to be very effective in anything other than pve. your second logi is like half a logi at best.

you can also ofc try pochven, there is a whole bunch of pvp going on in there, I finally went in there and killed a rogue drone to make the trigs friendly. but there are ppl cloaked in the anoms. I wasn't in there that long but I saw a big gang of ishtars and vagabonds roll through. I think there are a lot of solo hunters in pochven. solo, duos, trios etc.the force multiplier is strong in eve so you only do yourself a disservice by not grouping up with at least 2-4 others. that way you can stomp on other 3-5man groups or at least, potentially. you have signal and noise filaments that will either teleport you to a nullsec that has had some recent activity or a completely random nullsec. so this allows you to go out to null and try to catch ppl ratting, without needing to go past all the gate camps. you can also then use pochven filaments to get back to highsec.

[Kodokuro]

I liked to kill rats in low sec with a BS fitted to PVP.
i did found very often cruisers that use cover cynos but never tried to fight them, not even for the luls.

Fighting alone is obviusly not recomendend because there is alway someone with more friends ready to destroy you. Solo players can only outsmart gangs and multiboxers to survive.

Solo pvp is an expense. Only is an investment for gangs and multiboxers so dont hope to make money this way.

[Myriad]

When I was heavy into it a year ago, I found that you see the biggest multiboxing while mining, sometimes a dozen. Some of those multiboxers are respectful, and actively try not to encroach on your asteroid, while others can be ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. To each their own.

In combat settings, I found most use only two or three. Two mostly for a scout or logistics. Three for both.

[Vireys]

Originally posted by Heathy:

well a vast majority of the pve is done solo, because it simply doesn't really scale that well (so there are plenty of ppl out there killing npcs by themselves in a place where you can tackle them). you can get 1v1s especially in faction warfare. but it is beneficial to group up there is nothing that separates small groups and solos from huge blobs. the only thing you can do is join a wormhole corp and then the size of escalations is capped by mass limits. you can't really have massive blobs roaming through w-space because they'll roll themselves apart.

I personally don't like trying to play two characters on grid at the same time, tabbing between them and locking new targets and pressing f1, its clunky, using characters as scouts or warp-ins, market alts, hauling alts etc. this is the larger portion of multi boxing, doing things that doesn't require all of your attention. I can probably dual box a basilisk chain, just two logis but my reaction time on healing ppl with both characters is going to be severely hampered. its wayyy better that all ships on grid fighting, are being controlled by an actual player. needing to tab back and forth just becomes a clusterfk the more accounts you're doing that with. tabbing to lock new ppl, tabbing to see which of your characters is being primaried, tabbing to make sure each character is still anchored or aligned its just confusing. you get to the point where you can have a capital pilot on grid with a subcap pilot, some combos might work but some are just too moment to moment intensive and you'll be splitting your reaction time across two clients. I don't think dual boxing logi is going to be very effective in anything other than pve. your second logi is like half a logi at best.

you can also ofc try pochven, there is a whole bunch of pvp going on in there, I finally went in there and killed a rogue drone to make the trigs friendly. but there are ppl cloaked in the anoms. I wasn't in there that long but I saw a big gang of ishtars and vagabonds roll through. I think there are a lot of solo hunters in pochven. solo, duos, trios etc.the force multiplier is strong in eve so you only do yourself a disservice by not grouping up with at least 2-4 others. that way you can stomp on other 3-5man groups or at least, potentially. you have signal and noise filaments that will either teleport you to a nullsec that has had some recent activity or a completely random nullsec. so this allows you to go out to null and try to catch ppl ratting, without needing to go past all the gate camps. you can also then use pochven filaments to get back to highsec.

Me , im super duper rich and i think im a major exeption in EvE by the sole fact that i indeed have 2 (TWO) ! x monitors, this is super rare and i don't know many other who has the immense finances to buy a whole second monitor, thats why your point of ALT+TABBIBG is very very solid one and it does indeed take the dual boxing to a new hard level.

-Sarcasm off- ;)

Most people have 2 monitors.

Now i f we take the ALT+TAB out of the equation it is indeed very fast and effective to hover your mouse to the other monitor, for me this is not a challenge at all.

You just click target and then you click heal and orbit, now you have a heal bot orbiting you and healing you, you can do same with a CC ship too. Click enemy -->orbit-->start drains+ cc --> now you have CC+Drains bot running on the enemy free at will.

But i think youre assestment on fights happening 1vs 1 are slim to none, this is not the best game for a player who likes to solo alot or expects to find anything wortwhile to battle on their own. Thats a big bummer for many players, but such is EvE.

Thanks for youre points i will take them in to consideration.

[Vireys]

Originally posted by Myriad:

When I was heavy into it a year ago, I found that you see the biggest multiboxing while mining, sometimes a dozen. Some of those multiboxers are respectful, and actively try not to encroach on your asteroid, while others can be ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. To each their own.

In combat settings, I found most use only two or three. Two mostly for a scout or logistics. Three for both.

Aha most use 2-3 in combat settings, good info. Maybe i should give in to the lure and sub and IP 2-3 account so i can enjoy my time on somewhat equal footing as multiboxers. Seems unfair to me, but this is EvE in a nutshell hehe ;).

Since multiboxing seems to be the norm, maybe we should start adding to the EvE guides that new players should consider leveling the mandatory 2-4 added accounts to play this game on somewhat equal footings with the rest, or atleast mention this so the "new guns "know what they are getting in to , hehe BOOM NOOB CRY FOR ME is the song of EvE i like it when the new players feel frustrated and bad and fight in unequal terms, the best thing is to hunt them from system to system, the further they run the better the Boom Boom....all noobs welcome hehehe .

But maybe its not needed since no one flies what they can't afford to loose anyway, if they do its against the canon, so in principle no one ever looses anything that matters to them anyway, its impossible if you follow the canon.

[Vireys]

Originally posted by Kodokuro:

I liked to kill rats in low sec with a BS fitted to PVP.
i did found very often cruisers that use cover cynos but never tried to fight them, not even for the luls.

Fighting alone is obviusly not recomendend because there is alway someone with more friends ready to destroy you. Solo players can only outsmart gangs and multiboxers to survive.

Solo pvp is an expense. Only is an investment for gangs and multiboxers so dont hope to make money this way.

Yeh fighting alone is indeed not recommended, thanks for the tip on the cruisers with cover cynos, stealth is a tricky mechanic to counter when you fly solo.

I agree that for a solo player who doesent like social aspects this game is not the best option, thos who want to find solo kills should either IP the 2-4 accounts atleast if they want to solo.

[Heathy]

its not a matter of having two monitors, I have two monitors, but have you ever tried to play a game that requires all of your attention and watch a movie at the same time.

tell me how well did that go, did you fully focus on both things simultaneously, or were you playing the game while the movie is just playing on the other screen.

just having two monitors doesn't mean you automatically gain the ability of dual focus. you might think its somehow intuitive, but it actually isn't intuitive to focus on two things that require all of your attention. I prefer to use one monitor and use Eve-o Preview to switch between the clients because having two monitors or putting one client on each monitor, depending on your monitor size you're going to have to move your mouse WIDE from left to right between both clients, vs keeping the mouse on one screen and tabbing between them. I've tried it doesn't work as well as you might think that it does, one of your box is going to get neglected because you'll be focusing on the other toon for too long.

its not so bad if its something largely passive like mining, all you need to do is glance at your mining hold every so often or cycle the boosts and compressor. but in pvp things are changing constantly. which means you have to adapt to those changes. with all of your clients. its intuitive to react with one character, but there is going to be a lag on other characters they won't have the same reaction time.

[Vireys]

Originally posted by Heathy:

its not a matter of having two monitors, I have two monitors, but have you ever tried to play a game that requires all of your attention and watch a movie at the same time.

tell me how well did that go, did you fully focus on both things simultaneously, or were you playing the game while the movie is just playing on the other screen.

just having two monitors doesn't mean you automatically gain the ability of dual focus. you might think its somehow intuitive, but it actually isn't intuitive to focus on two things that require all of your attention. I prefer to use one monitor and use Eve-o Preview to switch between the clients because having two monitors or putting one client on each monitor, depending on your monitor size you're going to have to move your mouse WIDE from left to right between both clients, vs keeping the mouse on one screen and tabbing between them. I've tried it doesn't work as well as you might think that it does, one of your box is going to get neglected because you'll be focusing on the other toon for too long.

its not so bad if its something largely passive like mining, all you need to do is glance at your mining hold every so often or cycle the boosts and compressor. but in pvp things are changing constantly. which means you have to adapt to those changes. with all of your clients.

Now i f we take the ALT+TAB out of the equation it is indeed very fast and effective to hover your mouse to the other monitor, for me this is not a challenge at all.

You just click target and then you click heal and orbit, now you have a heal bot orbiting you and healing you, you can do same with a CC ship too. Click enemy -->orbit-->start drains+ cc --> now you have CC+Drains bot running on the enemy free at will.

My point being, after you set orbit -->activate youre abilities you want activated (Drains, heals, CC) you are all set, you dont need to even look at the second monitor, you can close it.

Stuff is automated and now you constantly have healingbot, CC-bot or drain-bot that doesen't require much attention for the fight.

[Heathy]

again you have to try these things rather than simply making assumptions. come back when you've tried this rather than simply assuming that its as simple as you claim it to be. i've tried pvp with both characters and I just found it cumbersome. you have to switch your attention between both clients frequently and it just isn't fun to play like that.

its why when I dual box PVE my second ship is typically a drone boat using sentries, so I don't have to keep switching to it, the drones will just keep shooting until there is nothing left to shoot. in pvp however, players focus fire, they switch targets, they warp around. if you can't get your characters to both align when the FC says align you're going to end up having one character lagging behind which will lead to you eventually getting tackled as the time it takes for you to align your first character then switch over to the other and tell that one to align. your alt is going to be the dude that you see warp off last, and this is what will get you caught by ships like the lachesis.

[Vireys]

This is just one video of many many other videos like it, where it shows the massive true power of multiboxing.

Oure hero is gaught on flying missions and has found out he is trapped!

What you do when in trouble? You activate the multibox help and fly them over from 3 systems away and this power is so huge he survived the nice trap with the true player skills of multiboxing.

New players should take this tip and start thinking multi instead of single to be on par with the current fun meta PvP.

Watch and learn:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnNcjsuM2XI

[Shotgun]

Originally posted by Vireys:

My point being, after you set orbit -->activate youre abilities you want activated (Drains, heals, CC) you are all set, you dont need to even look at the second monitor, you can close it.

When you say stuff like this, it makes it fairly evident that you haven't done much (if any) PvP or higher-end PvE content in the game. Which is fine in itself if you want to learn, but your posting kind if makes it seem like it's less about asking questions, and more about looking for others to reinforce the biases you possess against the game.

Regardless, as one of the game's more prolific solo PvPers, with about 2,000 solo kills across my characters (which isn't a brag, as some people have vastly more), I can tell you for a fact that this is not how the game works, and that you'll lose most of your encounters if you try to fight like this.

That said, multi-boxing is indeed a big problem in EVE, with some players running north of half a dozen accounts at the same time, though usually in very static fights like structure sieges, or a dozen or more accounts at the same time for activities like mining and certain combat PvE.

[Heathy]

sigh, other players are infinitely better than simply boxing more and more clients, jesus you'd think this would be obvious. you're always going to be better off actually making friends with a bunch of ppl who want to go out on roams, doesn't have to be that many ppl. between 5 and 10 is a decent small gang size, you still have to avoid the bigger fish, but you have the staying power to take on similar sized groups.

the more you practice with the same ppl, the more you fly with them, the more you tweak the ship doctrine you fly the more effective you'll become at it.

there is no point cherry picking random multiboxing scenarios because it'll play out in various ways, it might be a group of faction warfare players, or a group from wormhole space etc. there are loads of entities roaming around the game. multiboxing is such a small thing that doesn't even the odds at all. you simply have the power to lose more ships at the same time.

[Vireys]

Originally posted by Heathy:

again you have to try these things rather than simply making assumptions. come back when you've tried this rather than simply assuming that its as simple as you claim it to be. i've tried pvp with both characters and I just found it cumbersome. you have to switch your attention between both clients frequently and it just isn't fun to play like that.

its why when I dual box PVE my second ship is typically a drone boat using sentries, so I don't have to keep switching to it, the drones will just keep shooting until there is nothing left to shoot. in pvp however, players focus fire, they switch targets, they warp around. if you can't get your characters to both align when the FC says align you're going to end up having one character lagging behind which will lead to you eventually getting tackled as the time it takes for you to align your first character then switch over to the other and tell that one to align. your alt is going to be the dude that you see warp off last, and this is what will get you caught by ships like the lachesis.

Everyone uses the one software im not mention here or similiar program anyways to automate the process when doing something serious with multibox, like you can clearly see from this conversation:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Eve/comments/8uiga2/best_multiboxing_software_free_or_isk/


Please stop with this nonsense that moving mouse to other monitor is hard. It just isnt. For me atleast.

[Vireys]

Originally posted by Shotgun:

Originally posted by Vireys:

My point being, after you set orbit -->activate youre abilities you want activated (Drains, heals, CC) you are all set, you dont need to even look at the second monitor, you can close it.

When you say stuff like this, it makes it fairly evident that you haven't done much (if any) PvP or higher-end PvE content in the game. Which is fine in itself if you want to learn, but your posting kind if makes it seem like it's less about asking questions, and more about looking for others to reinforce the biases you possess against the game.

Regardless, as one of the game's more prolific solo PvPers, with about 2,000 solo kills across my characters (which isn't a brag, as some people have vastly more), I can tell you for a fact that this is not how the game works, and that you'll lose most of your encounters if you try to fight like this.

That said, multi-boxing is indeed a big problem in EVE, with some players running north of half a dozen accounts at the same time, though usually in very static fights like structure sieges, or a dozen or more accounts at the same time for activities like mining and certain combat PvE.

Ok thanks for your tips, good info, very helpful.

Do you personally think it would be a good idea to include multiboxing in the new player guides to let new players get familiar about the mechanics of EvE in this regard? Or is it better for them to notice it for them selves? It would save them alot of time to start training the multibox army right away.

[Heathy]

I can't really explain it to you, I have 1x 1440p monitor, 1x 1080p monitor, I can crank the sensitivity up so that it takes a small flick to get the cursor from one screen to the other, but then the sensitivity is too high for a single screen.

its no the doing it that is difficult, I never said it was difficult, I said it wasn't intuitive because the sheer scale of moving it back and forth.

I dual boxed nestors in a c5 doing the drifter escalation, that wasn't so bad because the nestor were cap chaining to each other so each box was a single unit, one nestor capping and repping the other. but I still had to mouse back and forth and back and forth and back and forth over and over and over and over again, to tell the drones which target to attack.

its just better to have them on one screen like the guy in the multiboxing video, then you don't have to move the mouse that much. there is still a delay and that delay is what will get your boxes killed in pvp.